PBL-G2 - GQ&A-Pollution

Pollution

Guiding Question

How much do I emit?

Guiding Activity

Students will evaluate their school recycling program and determine how much paper pollution the school emits. They will keep a detailed weekly blog about school's program and recommend improvements and become more paperless.

Instructions...

Before beginning this project, discuss with students the difference between social and academic writing. While it might be acceptable for students to use emoticons and acronyms when chatting on Facebook, academic writing should be grammatically correct, thought-provoking, and should end with questions designed to invite meaningful discussions. Students should know that blogging is reading as well as writing. Have students start off by reading blogs created by other middle school students about their recycling program. Students may start off reading the following blogs or find other appropriate blogs.

Now students are ready to post, but before they can start putting their thoughts online, they need to learn the logistics of formatting and writting a post. Even though there are many resources for creating a blog, our class will using Blogspot. Formatting in most are very similar. The following is a brief overview of how to post a discussion and reply.

Add a New Post or a Reply

write-a-post

After you are finished with your disussion, click "Post."

Beginning the Discussion

Students will research the current school policy/program for recycling paper. They will begin by discussing the following questions

Does our program effect our school or the entire district?
How do we recycle in our school?
Who or what group is in charge of our program?
What is our recycling schedule?
How much do we recycle?
Who delivers our paper goods?
What company handles our recycling program?
Do we just recycle paper?

Once these basic questions are answered students will start observing where in the school is the most paper used; how can it be reduced; what improvements would students recommend. Students will use the classroom blog to explore these and other issues.